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Wed, 15 Aug 2018 00:45:43 +0300en-gbUN Says One Million Children at Risk in Idlib Province as Assad Regime Escalates Attackshttp://en.etilaf.org/all-news/political-news/un-says-one-million-children-at-risk-in-idlib-province-as-assad-regime-escalates-attacks.html
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The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) on Monday warned that the lives of one million Syrian children living in Idlib could be at risk as the Assad regime forces and Russia have stepped up bombardment of residential areas and vital centers in the province.

Geert Cappelaere, UNICEF Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa, said that said that 28 children have reportedly been killed in Idlib and western Aleppo in the past 36 hours. He said that the death toll included an entire family of seven.

The Syrian Coalition earlier underscored that the Assad regime and Russia were committing war crimes against civilians in Idlib as they continue to target residential areas and vital civilian centers.

Furthermore, three UNICEF-supported health facilities were also attacked, two of which are now out of service, Cappelaere added.

Assad regime and Russia’s military escalation has killed many civilians recently, including children and women. Idlib province became overcrowded following a series of mass forced displacement operations by the Assad regime, its Russian ally and the Iranian terrorist militias.

According to the UN estimates, four million people currently live in Idlib province. First Response Coordinators in northern Syria said that around 800,000 people live in makeshift camps and suffer dire humanitarian conditions.

The Syrian Coalition stressed the need for new measures by the international community to prevent the regime from launching new wave of airstrikes against Idlib province. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)

The United Nations on Monday launched two media campaigns to protect humanitarian workers under the title "Not a target" and another one calling for protecting civilians in Syria. A rights group said that 10,204 civilians were killed in Syria in 2017.

In a statement, the UN said that civilians and humanitarian workers are not targets, stressing that civilians must be spared the fighting. It added: "Help protect civilians be in battles and conflicts."

On August 6, the United Nations condemned attacks by the Assad regime and its allies in Idlib province. UN Secretary General spokesman Farhan Haq called for the protection of civilians.

In its 15th report issued in March of this year, the International Commission of Inquiry on Syria said that deliberate attacks against civilians in Syria continued.

The Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR) earlier said that at least 10,204 civilians were killed in Syria 2017. In its annual report issued on January 1, 2018, the Network said that the victims included 2,098 children and 1,536 women despite the announcement of a cessation of hostilities under the so-called ‘de-escalation zones agreement.’

The Network pointed out that Assad regime forces bear the greatest responsibility for crimes against civilians, followed by the international anti-ISIS coalition forces.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Syria said that civilians, humanitarian workers, services providers and health workers must not be a target.

Activists in Idlib province said that a woman and a girl were killed in shelling on the towns of Al-Tih and Tahtaya, just two days following brutal airstrikes that targeted the provinces of Idlib, Hama and Aleppo killing dozens of people, including children and women. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)

Amnesty International has launched a petition urging the Assad regime to disclose the fate or whereabouts of the people it forcibly disappeared in its prisons. In recent weeks, the Assad regime has issued lists containing the names of thousands of detainees who died under torture in its prisons.

Amnesty urged Russia and the influential countries in Syria to push the Assad regime to disclose the whereabouts and fate of the missing and disappeared.

Since the Syrian revolution begun in 2011, more than 75,000 people have vanished or have been forcibly disappeared, mostly by the Assad regime, the watchdog group said. Many have been tortured or ill-treated in prisons, and more than 15,000 have died in custody as a result, Amnesty added.

The Assad regime is subjecting tens of thousands of civilians, aid workers and peaceful activists to enforced disappearance or arbitrary detention - just to spread fear and collective punishment amongst the Syrian civilian population, Amnesty said.

Amnesty went on to say that these practices are carried out as part of a widespread, systematic attack directed against the civilian population. They clearly violate international law, and in many cases, constitute war crimes.

The Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR) said it had documented the names of more than 118,000 people who were detained in Syria, 88 percent of whom were in the Assad regime's custody. It is estimated that the real number exceeds 215,000.

Amnesty called for taking action and pledging support for the families of the missing and disappeared. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)

The UN children's agency warned that military escalation on Idlib would threaten the lives of some 350,000 children as the Assad regime launched fierce airstrikes in the province on Friday, killing eight people.

In a statement on Thursday, UNICEF warned that around 350,000 children would find no place to go if violence escalates in the province of Idlib. For the children of Syria everywhere, UNICEF calls for prioritizing children and their needs and placing children above all political, military and strategic gains and agendas, it said.

The agency said that there are more than one million children in Idlib who are exhausted of war and fearful of uncertainty, violence and further displacement.

“Many children were forced to flee, some up to seven times. Most now live in overcrowded camps and shelters in rural areas. Food, water and medicine are in extremely short supply. Any further escalation in violence will have catastrophic consequences on the province which is host to one of the largest communities of internally displaced people in Syria.”

Children in Syria told UNICEF they’ve had enough. “The children of Syria cannot and should not endure another wave of violence, nor another fierce battle and certainly not more killing," said Geert Cappelaere, UNICEF Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa.

According to the United Nations estimates, the province of Idlib is home to more than four million civilians after hundreds of thousands of people have been forcibly displaced to the province by the Assad regime.

Dozens of violent airstrikes hit several villages and towns in rural Idlib, Hama and Aleppo on Friday, leading to a new wave of displacement and the suspension of work in many educational and medical institutions for fear of further bombardment. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)

A German newspaper warned that the Assad regime prepared a list of three million wanted persons both in the country and abroad with the aim of taking reprisals against them for participating in the activities of the Syrian revolution. Russia has been recently pushing for repatriating millions of Syrian refugees.

Bild newspaper reported that the information was leaked from a meeting chaired by the head of Air Force Intelligence Directorate, General Jamil Hassan, and held with 33 intelligence officers who discussed the mechanism to deal with the next phase in the conflict in Syria.

According to the newspaper, Hassan claimed that 150,000 businessmen are involved in financing the revolution, adding: “We will hold accountable anyone involved by word, deed or even silence.”

Hassan said that the three million people on the list - many of them refugees - should be treated as terrorists and liquidated after their return," the paper added.

The paper added that refugees would be in real danger if they return in the absence of international guarantees and political transition, indicating that the returnees will have to choose between being killed or killers of opponents of the regime.

Jamila Schäfer, spokeswoman for the Green Youth Party, told Bild that “anyone who seriously believes that we can send Syrian refugees back to their country in the foreseeable future, is either completely unworldly or simply inhumane."

Secretary of the Coalition’s political committee Riad al-Hassan on Thursday said that facts on the ground proved that Russia does not have the ability to rein in the actions of the Assad regime, citing the countless crimes regime forces committed against civilians in areas that recently fell under their control.

“The Assad regime’s repeated violations against civilians have revealed the dark side of the Russia role in Syria,” Hassan said, adding: “The assurances Moscow has given to the international community were simply worthless.” (Source: Syrian Coalitions’ Media Department)

Out of 163 countries, Syria was ranked the least peaceful country in the world on the 2018 World Peace Index, a position it has held for the past five years. Russia, which has recently begun pushing for the return of Syrian refugees, was classified as the least peaceful European country.

According to Inab Baladi local news website, Syria got 3,600 points, making it the most dangerous country in the world. The findings were published in a report which is annually produced by the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP).

Afghanistan, South Sudan, Iraq, Somalia and Yemen comprised the remaining least peaceful countries, according to the report.

According to the index, 93 countries became safer, while 68 countries become less safe in 2018.

IEP, a non-partisan think tank headquartered in Sydney, Australia, ranks 163 independent states and territories in three domains – safety and security in the society, involvement in ongoing conflicts, and militarization – according to 23 qualitative and quantitative indicators.

The Syrian Coalition earlier stressed that there will be no safe environment in Syria with the Assad regime in power and as long as its intelligence and security services as well as the Iranian terrorist militias are committing the most heinous crimes against Syrian civilians.

Assad regime forces executed killed military doctor Mu'taz Hteitani who defected from Assad’s army in 2013 and existed eastern Ghouta via the so-called ‘safe passages’ that Russia offered to people who were trapped inside the Damascus suburb. The fate of dozens of workers in medical, educational and relief organizations who are in the regime’s custody remains unknown.

Human rights groups published lists of names of thousands of detainees who were killed under torture in the Assad regime's detention facilities. The Assad regime sent identical lists to civil registry departments in Syrian provinces, which is one of the reasons behind ranking Syria as the most dangerous country in the world. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)

The United Nations condemned continued attacks by the Assad regime and its allies in Idlib province. According to the Syrian Civil Defense, the attacks killed and wounded more than 1,000 people in July, mostly children and women.

"The United Nations strongly condemns attacks against civilians, aid workers and civilian and humanitarian infrastructure," said UN deputy spokesman Farhan Haq at the UN headquarters in New York on Monday.

The UN continues to call for securing protection of civilians and infrastructure in accordance with International Humanitarian Law, Haq added.

“The United Nations remains concerned over reports of continued violence in Syria's Idlib governorate causing civilian deaths and destruction of civilian infrastructure.”

Ahmad Shaykhu, communications officer of the civil defense corps in Idlib, on Tuesday told Smart News Network that 73 people, including nine women and five children, were killed. More than 970 others, including 280 women, 233 children and 22 volunteers of the civil defense were injured.

He said that the civilian casualties were caused by various reasons, including bombings by the Assad regime and Russian forces, explosive remnants of war, explosions of landmines and improvised explosive devices, armed clashes, fires and road accidents.

Although Idlib is one of ‘de-escalation zones’, the province has been coming under sporadic attacks by the Assad regime and Russia. The Civil Defense earlier said that at least 127 civilians were killed and hundreds more wounded, mostly women and children, in June. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)

Great Britain’s Minister for the Middle East and North Africa, Alistair Burt said that those responsible for torture and killings of detainees in Syria must be held to account. The remarks came in response to the Assad regime’s recent issuance of thousands of death notices for thousands of detainees who died in its prisons.

“The issuing of thousands of prisoner death notices by the regime authorities provides another clear indication of the brutality the Assad regime has inflicted on the Syrian people,” Burt said in a press release on Thursday.

Burt added: “These notices do not bring an end to the issue. The regime must now clarify the situation of all those who remain missing, and release all those still arbitrarily detained, in accordance with UN Security Council Resolutions 2254 and 2268.”

“Moreover, the families of the deceased deserve justice. Those responsible for torture and killings must be held to account.”

Head of the Syrian National Commission on the Defense of Detainees, Yasser Farhan, said that the mass executions being carried out by the Assad regime against detainees, and the issuance of the death notices constituted war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity.

Farhan said that this is a deliberate, systematic policy being practiced by the regime against detainees in its prisons. He called on the United Nations to open an investigation into those violations and crimes which he described as "a disgrace to the world." (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)

Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri said that he would not visit Syria and meet with Bashar al-Assad under any circumstances even if this rejecting will cost him his position.

Following a meeting of the Future Bloc on Tuesday, Hariri said: "You will never see me in Syria even if the whole regional equation overturns. If Lebanon's national interests require this visit, then I will resign.”

Hariri denounced insistence of some Lebanese government officials on the normalization of relations with the Assad regime. He said: "Some Lebanese politicians are more eager to go to Syria than Syrian refugees themselves.”

Hariri also slammed the Assad regime for issuing Law No. 10, noting that the move is aimed at discouraging Syrian refugees from returning to their homes.

Hariri earlier accused Bashar al-Assad of being behind the assassination of his father, former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri, in Beirut in 2005. He asserted that the five main culprits are members of Hezbollah, adding that everyone knows well who gave the order to kill his father. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)

A UN official on Friday told the UN Security Council that the first quarter of 2018 saw a 348 percent increase in killing and maiming of children in Syria compared to the previous quarter.

This year has been particularly woeful for Syria's children as violations against them rise significantly, according to a UN monitoring body, which has verified more than 1,200 such violations, including the deaths or injury of more than 600 children.

Virginia Gamba, Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, said that over 100 attacks on hospitals and medical facilities or personnel have been verified since the beginning of 2018.

The grave violations of children's rights included "sexual abuse of children,” added Gamba in her briefing to the Council.

Gamba called all on all parties involved in the conflict in Syria to comply with applicable obligations under the Convention of the Rights of the Child and its optional protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflict.

“I further call on all parties to the conflict in Syria to take immediate measures to ensure that their military operations are conducted in full compliance with international law including through respecting the principles of distinction, proportionality and precaution.”

The Assad regime has launched major offensive in different parts of Syria since the beginning of this year, committing war crimes that affected children, according to human rights organizations.

The Syrian Network for Human Rights said that at least 1,104 children were killed in the first half of this year, of which 616 were killed by the Assad regime, 138 by the Russian forces, and 113 by the international anti-ISIS coalition. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)